Tu B’shvat, Curiosity on Court, Science and much more!

Dear Kindergarten Families,

We had a wonderful week in Kindergarten! On Wednesday, we enjoyed the Tu B’Shvat Fair with our buddies learning about trees, the environment and tasting the fruit of trees. On Thursday, we had lots of fun climbing, running around, exploring and playing at Curiosity on Court! Thank you to Lisa, Almah’s mom for organizing the trip and to our wonderful chaperones: Jinah, Yulia, Lana and Zina!

The children are bringing home a book about Rainbow based on a song (a gift from Scholastic to our class) and here is the site to listen to this book/song. The children can read and sing along. Enjoy!

In Math, we learned about counting to 100 by 10s and 1s. We practiced finding numbers that come between two numbers (for example, 47 and 49, or played “what number is missing?” ), comparing numbers (Which is bigger: 67. 71 or 76?), and much more. Every student is bringing home (in the Blue Friday Folder) their 100 Chart for practicing counting, finding specific numbers and playing other games. Please, ask your child what games they know about two-digit numbers, and continue counting with them!

In English Language Arts, we learned the letter Ss and the sound /s/ it makes (as in ‘sit’). We practiced forming upper and lowercase Ss letters using our Handwriting Without Tears books, wooden planks, writing on Sand, and finding words that start with S and drawing pictures of them.

We have been reading many new fairy tales or interpretations of the old familiar fairy tales in a modern way, such as “Goldy Luck and Three Pandas” or “The Little Ninja Riding Hood,” and so on. In Writing, we continued our Narrative Writing – Fairy Tales unit. We are almost done writing and illustrating our own fairy tales.

In Social Studies, we continued learning about American Presidents in preparation for President’s Day. We talked about Abraham Lincoln and how he kept papers in his hat to help him remember important papers. We acted out the story from the book “Abe Lincoln’s Hat” that we read together.

We also learned about Groundhog Day and its funny traditions. We experimented with shadows and read a funny book “Go to Sleep, Groundhog!” by Judy Cox.

In Science this week we continued our unit Exploring Plants and Animals. We investigated and observed 4 types of plants (succulent, conifer, bamboo, and flowering plants) and drew what we noticed. We discussed the similarities and differences between the plants. We also began our experiment to see what happens when we put white carnations in different food coloring.

Hebrew and Judaic
This week we continued learning about parts of the body. We played Simon Says in Hebrew and the game ”what is missing” which is a fun memory game with different toys. We reviewed words we learned so far and the beginning sound and letters. We introduced the letter Daled and the children recognized words starting with the “D” sound such as dag-fish, dvash-honey,  dov- bear, dvorah- bee, dolfin- dolfin. We sang the song “Ani Rochetz Yadayim” And “Tu Bishvat Hegiah.“ We also read books such as  “Chanan Haganan” by Rinat Hopper and “Hayom Hayarok” by Shulamit Tzarfati.
This week we celebrated Tu B’shvat, the birthday for the trees. We colored and cut pictures of fruits from the Shivaat Haminim, the seven kinds of fruits and grains from Ancient Israel, and pasted them on a nice crown. We sang the song Eretz Chitah U’seorah  which is about the Shivaat Haminim.
“Eretz chita u’s’ora v’gefen u’t’eina v’rimon, eretz zayit shemen u’dvash.” A land of wheat and barley and grapevine and fig and pomegranate, a land of olive oil and honey.
The seven kind of fruits are: chita- wheat, seorah- barley, gefen- grapes /vain, te’enah-fig, rimon-pomegranet, zait- olive, tamar- date (no need to memorize). And finally we learned about the bracha – blessing we say before eating a fruit which is “boreh pri haetz”.
Baruch atah A-donay, Elo-heinu Melech Ha’Olam borei pri ha-aitz. (- Blessed are you, L-rd our G‑d, King of the universe, who creates the fruit of the tree.)

Have a nice weekend!

Shabbat Shalom,

Regina, Rachel, Irit, and Ilana

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Writing letter S on Sand

Making Spiral Snakes

Experimenting with matter: corn starch+colored water = ooblick

Exploring Seashells

Making a card for Jorge!

Tu B’shevat Fair with our 4th grade buddies

Snack with Buddies

Acting out a story about Abraham Lincoln

Making posters about Living and Non-living things

Having fun at Curiosity on Court

Studying plants in science class

Art with Iviva:

Celebrating Tu B’shvat continued in art as we learned about and drew the seven significant plants (dates or palm trees, fig trees, olive trees, pomegranate trees, wheat, barley and grapes). Some of us even made birthday cards for trees.